


A Fejedelem

by NathalieWeasley



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-25
Updated: 2014-11-25
Packaged: 2018-02-27 00:17:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2671808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NathalieWeasley/pseuds/NathalieWeasley
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is the line between them, the one Albus cannot cross and the one Gellert does not see.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Fejedelem

**Author's Note:**

> Massive thank you, as always, to amorette, my wonderful, wonderful beta. Thanks also go to Mom!Nath and S who read over the fic and encouraged me. Title comes from the Hungarian version of Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince. Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.

Albus visits Nurmengard the one time. He has been there before, obviously, to set the wards, but this visit is the one true – visit. He runs his fingers along the cool stones of the prison, the power of his wards radiating through him, warm and heavy. But now, unlike when he first set them up, there is a twist in them. Another power is wrapped around his own, sharp and tangy, the mixture enticing and thrilling, yet somehow very wrong. He closes his eyes to better sense the power without distraction, and it wraps him up, the threads of his power and Gellert’s dancing in a grotesque parody of the way their bodies once intertwined. He wonders if Gellert finds the similarity amusing. Most likely.  
  
The guard escorting him to the centre of the castle has disappeared, likely left behind when the power became overwhelming. It is no matter, really. Albus’s knowledge of magic and his keen sense of its tremors is unsurpassed by all, with the exception perhaps of the one he is searching for; he does not need guidance. The reminder of their similar strength tastes bitter. What could have been, what should have been… And yet, and yet! There is the line between them, the one Albus cannot cross and the one Gellert does not see. Albus was (is) in love with an  _ideal_  of Gellert, a perfect form of the actual man. The man in this prison does not regret of the evaporation of their relationship. It is sentimental and sappy to place emotions and human weakness over power and ambition, no? Albus is weak, according to Gellert. Gellert is strong, disciplined, rising above those _pathetic_  traits that Albus so admires.  
  
Albus wonders if he was blind or if Gellert was. Did he ever wonder if Gellert had limitations? Did he ever voice concern over Gellert’s dismissal of the humanity he attempted to control?  
  
But as blind as he was, Gellert mimicked him, equal again in their ignorance of each other, ignorance of the one – one! – who could truly understand them. Gellert did not know Albus cared. But then again, Albus did not quite know it either.  
  
There is no comfort to be had here for Albus. The steady power around him is only a reminder that he is the sole barrier against the one man he could ever hold as an equal partner. The trust in him! To expect Albus to hold these wards, to put his own emotions down and away  _for the greater good_.  
  
He stops, lays a trembling hand on the wall. The irony permeates his body as the cold does, as the power did. He must breathe. He wants to explode, to hit, to fight, to return to some sort of natural human instinct. But is that not the point? It is humanity that he strives for, yearns for, admires so greatly. Gellert, on the other hand, craves the magic, not those who wield it.  
  
Albus can feel his heart breaking and cracking, the tissue then roughening into a scar to encase his emotions. He feels too strongly. His love, his affection and adoration and respect work against the need to ensnare a monster, the need to prevent more horrific deaths. The wards around him vibrate, and a perverse sense of amusement floods through him. Gellert is amused. Gellert, who emphasizes power over people, control over civilization, is laughing at Albus’s struggle of head and heart. A single tear slides down his cheek, and a new crack forms in the scar tissue around his heart.  
  
\--  
  
Bavaria is cold in the winter. A bitter wind whips through the thin wooden walls of the makeshift Wizarding Allied headquarters. Albus glances around at the shivering bodies. Casting a warming charm is not very wise at the moment; the magical cost of casting and sustaining the charm would come at the expense of protective enchantment or healing spell. Albus, on the other hand, can afford to siphon off some of his magical power. He casts silently, watching the faces around him pinken as the cold recedes. Yet Albus’s charm cannot wash away the terror around him. It is sickening, this need to  _fix_  humanity because of Gellert. Albus builds that which has been destroyed. Unnecessarily so.  
  
The fear is palpable. Even without the extending listening charm, Albus imagines one could hear the cries from the rally five miles north at Nurmengard. The shouts of the Nazis, the whistle of spells from Gellert’s followers, and – with straining ears – the despairing screams of the victims in the prison. Albus shuts his eyes to those around him. His heart is breaking. How could he? How could such a brilliant, brilliant man, his golden lover, his companion, his  _equal_  commit these crimes, destroy these lives? Albus opens his eyes, and the determination in them is matched throughout the room.  
  
\--  
  
The man behind the bars looks nothing like the golden Adonis Albus met so long ago. The hair no longer gleams, the skin is riddled with scars and wrinkles, and the body is ragged and starved. But the eyes! They pierce Albus’s even now, deep and dark and full of vengeful mirth. Albus closes his eyes. To feel, to be human, to look at the man to whom he has given his heart and soul only for them to be ripped apart and trampled….. He opens his eyes, hardening his heart, and looks directly at Gellert, emotions and feelings eviscerated and the vestiges sealed off. Gellert only smiles. There is no need to discuss the imprisonment, the wards, the deaths. Each knows where the other stands, and the two sides are irrefutably discordant. Another moment, and Albus turns and leaves.  
  
\--  
  
The blond boy with Bathilda is potentially the most beautiful boy Albus has ever seen. Not aesthetically – at least, not solely aesthetically, his body is quite fit – but, Merlin, the sheer  _power_  radiating from him makes Albus sway. The boy turns, then, and faces Albus head on. The power Albus has, that no one has been able to match let alone  _tolerate_ , swirls around that of the boy’s. The feeling of finding such an  _equal_  is intoxicating. They stand in the middle of a dusty road in Godric’s Hollow for a moment, two, and then the boy turns to follow Baggy up to her cottage.  
  
A smile erupts of Albus’s face. This boy is going to change his life.


End file.
